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"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed"

Friday, January 11, 2008

I need to learn how to take good pictures of the night sky as I live aways from city lights in the middle of a huge valley and have a big sky at night. I feel for those folks that live in big cities and have never really seen the night sky. I have been camping in the desert many, many times where we huddled close to a blazing fire and wondered at the incredible immensity of what seemed so close, stars ready for picking as if they were low hanging fruit. I love the high desert and spending time there brings a clarity of thinking, it is you and what engulfs you, a slap or reminder of what you really are just another creature in a quest for survival. You can't help but be in awe of the Glory of God's Creation.

Our night sky is brilliantly mixed with clouds and stars right now, I need to read up on my camera.

5 comments:

About 5 years ago, when I still lived in San Francisco, I discovered the perfect place to escape to for total peace and quiet: Fort Bragg, California, an upstate coastal town near Mendocino -- the roaring ocean crashing against large rocks 24/7 and the night sky covered with stars that were so clear you could pick out the constellations as though you were looking at labelled photos of them.

I am heading out of town for a short vacation at a place called Phillip Island, there too the night sky can take one's breath away. The vastness, the knowns and strikingly the unknowns.

Said, The American philosopher William James about the views of the science establishment amongst his Harvard colleagues a long time ago. I find his words so poignant that I present verbatim.

"Science has made such glorious leaps in the last 300 years that it is no wonder the worshippers lose their heads…I have heard more than one teacher say that all the fundamental conceptions of truths in science have been found and that the future has only the details of the picture to fill on. But the slightest reflection on the real conditions will suffice to show just how barbaric…crude…such notions are …whatever else be certain, this at least is. That the world of our present natural knowledge is enveloped in a larger world of some sort, of whose residual properties we, at present can frame no positive idea".

Over 100 years have passed since these statements. Has time not vindicated him?

Contributers

Founder"s Quote

Contemplate the mangled bodies of your countrymen, and then say, 'What should be the reward of such sacrifices?' Bid us and our posterity to bow the knee, supplicate the friendship, and plough, and sow, and reap, to glut the avarice of the men who have let loose on us the dogs of war, to riot in our blood and hunt us from the face of the earth? If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude than the animating contest of freedom, go from us in peace. We ask not your counsels or arms. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains sit lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen!"- Samuel Adams

"It is in vain, sir, to extentuate the matter. Gentlemen may cry, Peace, Peace--but there is no peace. The war is actually begun! The next gale that sweeps from the north will bring to our ears the clash of resounding arms! Our brethren are already in the field! Why stand we here idle? What is it that gentlemen wish? What would they have? Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!"---Patrick Henry